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<title>A Broken Heart is Terrible. This Feeling of Nothing to Break is far worse. by Ever_After_AAA</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28250511">A Broken Heart is Terrible. This Feeling of Nothing to Break is far worse.</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ever_After_AAA/pseuds/Ever_After_AAA'>Ever_After_AAA</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Manna is a very interesting concept! [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Body Horror, Gen, Mild Gore, Transformation, Zombie? Technically, disasociation</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 01:33:52</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,276</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28250511</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ever_After_AAA/pseuds/Ever_After_AAA</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Marcissan had spent far too long doing nothing for his people. He knows he can't do anything here. He knows he has to try.</p><p>I had a little fic about if Oliver was the only one to stay human with the Manna. I wrote it again, from the Poor Emperor's point of view.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jairo | Swaine &amp; Lars | Marcassin, Lars | Marcassin &amp; Oliver</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Manna is a very interesting concept! [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2072310</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Broken Heart is Terrible. This Feeling of Nothing to Break is far worse.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">


        <li>
            Inspired by

            <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26689453">Like the Rest of Us.</a> by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ever_After_AAA/pseuds/Ever_After_AAA">Ever_After_AAA</a>.
        </li>

    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Oliver had… Oliver had saved the world. Marcissan almost couldn't believe it. Couldn't believe that this child had done so much to gain so little in return. Oliver was so selfless. Marcissan admired that he could do it seemingly without fear. Marcissan himself, on the other hand? He was terrified of what he had become, of how he couldn't stop it. He was scared that his not-dead brother and these kids that treated Ga… his name is Swaine now. Swaine and these kids that treated him as if he were their older brother, as if Swaine hadn't met them only recently, hadn't met them as broken and damaged as heartbrokenness makes a person.</p><p>Marcissan would never admit it, but he was jealous. He hoped his brother wanted to spend time with him again. He hopes his brother hasn't forgotten about them in their years apart. Marcissan knows he hasn't. But that doesn't make the thought of it invoke less bone-deep, instinctual fear. He got his belief back but... Well, old habits die hard, he supposed. Marcissan wanted to stomp this old habit to the ground until he forgot what it looked like, what it felt like. Marcissan didn't know how long that would take.</p><p>Marcissan's home was cold. It was overwhelmingly hot from the smoke and lonely from the nobody who loved within its walls. </p><p>Marcissan hoped he would remember how to love. He was too terrified to think about what would happen if he forgot. He loved his brother. At some point. Surely he still does? Surely he's still human? He has to be. The other options……… he can't think about them.</p><p>(He does still love. The fact he is worried about not loving shows it clear as day. If he did not love his country and his home and his brother then he would not care to believe he does. Loving is human nature. Loving is instinctual. Instincts do not go away. They can be hidden, they can be suppressed, they can be nullified, but they can not be destroyed. Sometimes, people don't realize how much they love because they are hurting. And they focus so much on the hurt they cannot find the love. But it is hard to adore pain. And wounds need to heal before you can learn to love that you survived. When you can think of nothing but the suffering, you cannot think of the things you love.)</p><p>Marcissan is worried. For his country. They've spent so long with a ruler who does not rule, a leader who does not lead, a caretaker who does not care for them. He hopes they can forgive him. He's hurt them, each and every one of them.</p><p>(He doesn't know how many were heartbroken too, who can truly look at them and know their pain. Many will stay angry. Actions, no matter the circumstances, have consequences. The Emperor must work to gain many of his people's trust again. Marcissan will.)</p><p>And something is ailing his people. (Again) And he will not sit and let them hurt. (Again) He will not coward in his quarters. (Again)<br/>
He will not look away in disbelief. (Again)<br/>
He will save his people. (Again. He doesn't realize it, but he saved them when he saved Oliver. When he saved himself, ten years before he needed saving.)</p><p>Some strange… dust. Ash. Curse. Was befalling his city. He swore he would protect his citizens. He needs to be useful, to be worth something as a leader. He has not been affected by this terrible magic. Not yet. He has to try and get out, try and stop this wicked power from destroying what he has not yet worked hard to fix. He couldn't stand by while his home was driven into the ground. Not this time.</p><p>His advisors didn't want him to. They wanted him to stay safe, like he always did. To let this sort itself out, like it always did. To do nothing. Like he always had. But he will be an absent ruler no longer. He will take action, no matter how flimsy his help would hold. He knew it was a matter of time before he was corrupted. He only hoped he was wrong.</p><p>But of course, the one time he wants to be wrong, well and truly wants his missing belief to be misinformed, he is right. It looks like what he's always imagined snow to be. He's never seen it, but he has heard that it's pretty, light, and oh so dangerous to the unprepared. And Marcissan is unprepared. His world feels so fearfully different. He is there. But he cannot act. Cannot think. Cannot feel. Only experience. </p><p>The world greys, its colors just as vibrant as ever. Sounds are muted. Marcissan can hear the gentle grumbling of machines working in harmony, the whistles of working valves, the pained groans of his people and himself. He cannot feel, his hand is wrapped around his rotting staff and it is nothing. Heavy metal rests and rusts on his neck. His clothing falls heavy on light shoulders. He is in his throne room. The fountains sprinkle what should be a pleasant coolness that Marcissan does not feel. </p><p>He is changed. His skin is crystal clear. Every time he moves his skin cracks and reforms, like glass. His clothing is heavy on his form. The steady crinkle-crunch of his robes shattering the skin they touch is in his ears that do not know the sound is real. His hair is heavy and black, thick ebony whips ripping out and glueing themselves back into place, a halo of darkness fitting for someone of his place. His eyes are dull. They look straight ahead. He is looking at everything and seeing nothing. His lips are still. He is a porcelain doll. A porcelain doll with thick braids of veins that sit still and lifeless and a walking, lifeless body. He does not breathe. His heart is visible and still behind his translucent grey lungs. The heart is the only opaque part of his false body. He is more powerful than ever. He can not use this power in the slightest.</p><p>People enter. Living, breathing, people with hearts and souls right where they should be. Marcissan does not know them, because he doesn't know anything. Does not register the look of sheer horror on the tall one, the one clad in a green jacket. The one with tears in his eyes. Because Marcissan can no longer know what horror is, what height is, what the color green looks like. Why tears are real and painful. Marcissan no longer knows what pain could be.</p><p>He is hit. The sound he makes is a ragged, blood curdling scream. Flesh tears away like wet tissue paper. When it lands on the floor it shatters with an audible crack. The next hit lands in complete and utter silence. Marcissans heart beats once. </p><p>He cannot see the child sneaking behind him and he cannot see the spell she casts and he cannot see himself coming back to humanity.</p><p>He can see the tears in his brother's eyes, and hear the desperate sobs he didn't realize he was making. The world is hot and there and Gascon was never the type for physical affection, and Marcissan was never the one to ask for it, but as they step towards each other they don't need words to wrap desperate arms around the other, to protect and be protected, to feel something they know is real. The world is nightmarish. His brother is nothing of the sort. Not anymore.</p><p>Who is protecting who? </p><p>It doesn't really matter.</p>
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